Ms West, 27, is a native New Yorker from Long
Island who moved to Manhattan (to attend FIT)
in 1994. While at FIT, she turned
all her energy and creative expression into jewellery design. After
graduating in 1998, she created her first collection: a range of
leather cuffs inspired by hip-hop musicians. Since then, she has
expanded her creative horizons and her line to include sleek leather
earrings, oversized belts, abstract sterling silver and yellow gold
rings, pendants, earrings and necklaces, with the emphasis on ‘capturing
the true essence and spirit of the individual.
‘We all have such unique and divine attributes,’
says Ms West, ‘that gives us strength. My jewellery will simply
enhance the feeling of being yourself and loving every minute of
it.’
Her spring 2004 collection, the Abyss Collection:
Fine Jewelry for the Mind, Body and Imaginative Spirit, is at
once both powerful and delicate. As seen with Ms Givens’s collection,
each piece serves to play off a woman’s sense of herself. Her hammered
copper bracelets and bangles (priced between $30 and $350) are wearable
pieces of modern art. Her sterling silver raindrop earrings ($375)
have the added attraction of being able to accentuate any outfit
from a sexy Hervé Léger-esque bondage dress to a Cinderella
gown fit for a princess. For the customer with a more limited budget,
she also designed some very beautiful beaded earrings and necklaces
($80–$125). If you are looking to add a bit of toughness to your
outfit, then her leather slit cuffs with tie—long and short—and
wishbone leather earrings are just the right pieces. They come in
red, yellow, green, white and black leather, but custom colours
are available upon request from the individual client. These are
priced between $65 and $120. These two young ladies are well on
their way to even greater success in the market-place. You heard
it here first.
For more information, log on to their web site,
www.ashakagivens.com.
Paul Hardy
CALGARY-BASED
DESIGNER Paul Hardy came into New York City under a blaze
of pre-show publicity. Although Jeanne Beker, the host of Fashion
Television and the newly appointed editor-in-chief of Canada’s
Fashion Quarterly magazine,* proclaimed him to be ‘the only
Canadian designer to ever headline a collection at New York’s fashion
week’, Mr Hardy is hardly the first Canadian designer to wash up
on our shores during fashion week. One’s mind goes back to the design
team of Cloak, who has been showing in New York City for several
seasons now and so many small designers whose collections barely
made a ripple. But I digress. Mr Hardy was fêted at the Canadian
Embassy at a cocktail reception and prominently featured in pre-show
write-ups in all the important fashion columns. Ultimately, the
question becomes: did he deliver? Let’s just say that he aimed for
the fences, succeeding more often than failing.
CONTINUED
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While most everyone else was
looking towards Alice in Wonderland, Mr Hardy went into
the apocalyptic future and gave us a cleaner version of Mad Max
3: Beyond Thunderdome
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ABOVE: Paul Hardy.
BELOW: Y & Kei.
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